How Design Thinking Works In an Agile Environment
Written by: Genevieve Primavera
A few days ago, I posted an article about the difference between UX and UI design. In the article, I addressed Design Thinking and how the UX process starts before anything is to be built. A good friend and respected engineer challenged me after reading it, stating how he prefers the Agile approach. However these two concepts, I argued, do not have to exist exclusively, and can actually play well together. In short, Agile allows for a collaborative approach to solving problems. Design Thinking supports this process by defining what the problem is to be solved, first and foremost. Thus, my good friend inspired me to write this article.
What Exactly Is Design Thinking?
More than just a trendy new tech catchphrase, Design Thinking is a process which is akin to scientific thinking, insomuch as you have a hypothesis and you set out to prove it. IBM has recently implemented this practice in order to get better product out to market first by asking, “Who are you designing for, and what do they need?”
In order to understand Design Thinking, let’s first define it. Design Thinking stands on these five key tenets: Empathize, Define, Ideate, Prototype and Test.
Empathize
While many assumptions can be made about the user, actually knowing the users and their needs provides a lot more useful information, and can save much time in the iterative process. By observing the user, and understanding the user’s needs and behaviors within the context of what is intended to be built, helps better define what should be built.
Define
From what is discovered in the process of empathizing, a true problem statement can be derived, and which user-needs must be addressed and prioritized. These definitions can translate to product requirement lists, which start the ball rolling.
Ideate
This is the process where collaboration lives. Now that the problem to be solved has been accurately identified, teams can come together and iterate. This takes place through a series of mind mapping, sketching, discussions, post-it note sticking, white boarding, and loose prototyping on paper, as engineers and designers work together to solve the problems. Much can be envisioned and debated in this process, in order to chisel away at building the right product.
In this phase, once the brainstorming has surfaced solutions to the problems, the architecture and layout can be imagined, for the initial framework of the overall product.
Prototype
Again, much like the ideation process, the team can collaboratively work together to create wireframes and working prototypes. As these ideas come to life, in the thought process, defining what can be built, what will work, and what will serve the user best start to take shape.
Live clickable prototypes can be created either in HTML/CSS or using prototyping tools such as Axure, which can be tested. Likewise they are used as a basis for demonstrating to the team, how the intended outcome will operate.
Test
The ideas are tested among users to assure that the team has solved the right problems, and in such a way that delivers a successful solution. This too, can be considered part of the discovery phase, as the feedback helps better shape the product with what is learned. The team then will continue to iterate and test, until the MVP (Minimum Viable Product) is created.
How Agile Fits
Agile is based on the principles of adapting to change. Solutions scale and evolve over time. The team works iteratively as a unit, in a flexible environment, in order to respond to change without constraint.
Agile by itself, without the principles of Design Thinking, has teams designing and building in circles, and many times ending up with a product that resembles the Frankenstein of software applications. Design Thinking prevents the design and development process from existing within a vacuum, and allows for real user input and influence from the get-go. It allows for checks and balances, and proper roadmapping and budgeting, and even team building and project assignment. Rather than building in a cloud of uncertainty, the Agile process combined with Design Thinking, allows the team to create, making more deliberative and purposeful decisions. The work together by combining both Problem Finding (Design Thinking) with Problem Solving (Agile).
Lean
When we think of lean product design and development, we think of delivering that MVP, with quick collaborative iterations, and swift development. Since the process of Design Thinking unveils the unknown problems to be solved and tested, this lends itself well to a Lean Development team. There will be less rounds of iterations and roadblocks and more can be focused on improvement and feature additions, pushing the right product forward, rather than circling back to the drawing board, each and every time. The Lean team, this way, has less frustration and a smoother collaboration experience. In addition, it prevents those all too well known engineer and design wars, as the two are working more efficiently together, not going head to head on delivery dates because a better roadmap is defined, in the first place. Furthermore, it prevents those big, “Uh-ohs,” when a big discovery is made too far down the development pipeline because the team has been creating the wrong product, in the dark.
To quote IBM Institute for Business Value, “…the push to “get something out there” can lead to experiences that aren’t relevant to real customer needs…By building multidisciplinary teams and combining a design thinking approach with agile methodologies, you can release efficiently and increase the likelihood that a customer’s first impression will be a good one.”
Putting It Into Practice
Personally, I have seen both in practice. Teams operating without the Design Thinking process, end up frustrated, over budget, and not delivering on time. And when they do deliver, they have dissatisfied customers as a result. These companies end up either relying heavily on a large support team, or they lose their clientele to a competitor that comes along with a more usable product. Winning back the user, after delivering a product which is frustrating to use is close to impossible, as the user trust has been lost. The competitive company, the one that got it right, is now viewed as the hero, the one who listened and “gets it.”
Let’s take a look at how these two processes work together.
At the beginning of the Agile cycle, we have the creation of the vision and the plan. This is where the empathy stage takes place. User research takes place, questions are asked, discoveries are made, and user stories start to take form. Part of this process in identifying the user’s needs, also comes from exploring the market, and the competition, which also helps formulate that Problem Statement, in comparing what the user’s dilemma is versus what is out there and why it is n to working, and in many cases what is working, or how it can be improved. This gives us the bandwidth to start finding the solution, which is a collaborative process between the UX designer and the engineers. From this information a Product Backlog can be made, defining what will become the Product Requirements.
Once the Product Backlog is formulated, the define process of Design Thinking commences. This involves narrowing down that Requirements list, creating a Selected Product Backlog, as the basis for establishing the direction. Establishing these factors set the stage for ideation and Team Collaboration, in putting these ideas into thought as a product. The UX designer creates an Information and Features Architecture, which become the backbone for what the engineering team has to build upon. Not only that, it is an imperative part to Sprint Planning, as this architecture becomes the framework of a task list, and a roadmap. Features become tasks, and tasks are assigned accordingly, within the established time frame.
The team is now ready for the prototype phase of the Design Thinking tenets, with a plan of attack to deploy. UX, UI and Visual Designers will work with the engineers to establish what the front-end will look like, and how it will operate, within the given constraints of the technology and delivery dates, conducting Daily Sprints, within a check and balance system, constantly communicating.
Once something is in place to use, Testing commences. User testing, along with Quality Assurance is conducted, with results being reported back.
User testing is conducted by observing things like how well the user navigates through the application, where they get stuck, what challenges arise, and if the components are easily discoverable in a sensible hierarchy. QA can run metrics to show measurable usage and performance issues, as well.
All of this continues to take place, with ongoing Daily Sprints, to assure both design and development corrections are being made, and that the project is still keeping on task. Bugs and usability issues can be recorded in Project Management tools, such as Jira to document and track progress.
The Agile process continues, covering updates, improvements, and bug fixes. The early Design Thinking process may be complete for the moment, however, now that it is well documented, it can be returned to in the Agile process as a guide to make sure that the user’s needs are being met, and can even be updated with new issues that arise from User Testing. After a circle of reviews, testing and fixes, the MVP is ready to launch.
Done well, and keeping communication open with the user, post MVP launch, will allow for exciting and meaningful upgrades and additions in the pipeline of the product. Design Thinking resumes, as these new features are designed and developed, constantly keeping the user in the loop, and keeping the team working smoothly together, in a forward motion with intention.
